In the digital age, organizations increasingly rely on digitally-stored data. To protect against data loss, an organization may use a backup system to back up important data. Some traditional backup systems may utilize reverse-incremental backup datasets to back up data. In general, a reverse-incremental backup dataset of a data source may include (1) a full backup that backs up the most recent state of the data source and (2) one or more reverse-incremental backups that backs up the difference between the most recent state of the data source and prior states of the data source. In general, the most recent state of the data source may be restored directly from the full backup, and prior states of the data source may be restored by applying one or more of the reverse incremental backups to the full backup.
Many organizations rely upon data replication to conserve storage resources and/or to improve the reliability, fault-tolerance, and/or accessibility of their data. Data replication typically involves replicating data from a primary storage system to a remote secondary storage system. Unfortunately, replicating reverse-incremental backup datasets to remote secondary storage systems may produce unwanted results. For example, because the most recent backup in a reverse-incremental backup dataset may always be a full backup, replicating a reverse-incremental backup dataset to a remote secondary storage system may result in a full backup being transmitted to and stored on the remote secondary storage system each time data is backed up. Accordingly, the instant disclosure identifies and addresses a need for additional and improved systems and methods for maintaining remote backups of reverse-incremental backup datasets.